Information distribution has become increasingly important in today's society, in general, and to corporate entities in particular. Presently, corporations invest a tremendous amount of capital into various forms of information distribution. For example, a corporation may lay out substantial funds to distribute printed information throughout its various organizational branches or retail distribution outlets. However, as will be readily appreciated, the rate at which printed material becomes obsolete has accelerated in recent times. Accordingly, there has been a drive to distribute information in a more frequent, faster and more economical mode than printed media.
The rapid growth of the Internet, along with wide area networks (WANs) and local area networks (LANs), in tandem with the multimedia capabilities of personal computers and servers have made electronic media distribution the information dissemination mode of choice. For example, while corporate memoranda were once painstakingly copied or printed hundreds or thousands of times and distributed to employees, now a company-wide e-mail may be sent attaching the memoranda, thereby saving copy and distribution time and cost.
While broadband hypertext transport protocol (HTTP) or Internet protocol (IP) based networks providing TI, direct subscriber line (DSL) or cable connections are widely available, not all remote locations of a corporation, such as a corporation having multiple retail outlets, necessarily have access to broadband connections. Accordingly, electronic distribution of information in all corporate system is not always a reality.
Some retail outlets not having access to broadband connections may receive information through wide area broadcasts. In such cases, a satellite information distribution system may be used to broadcast information, which may be digital information or analog television information, to numerous retail outlets. For example, a speech of a corporate official may be repeatedly broadcast via satellite over a particular time period so that employees at various retail locations may view the speech. Wide area broadcasts, such as satellite broadcasts, are quite expensive. Therefore, as an alternative, the speech could be broadcast once and each retail outlet could record the broadcast for replay at periodic intervals to minimize broadcast expenses.